PhD candidate and researcher, Matteo Bittanti teaches video game culture and cinema at Libera Universita di Lingue e Comunicazione (IULM). He also organized and currently supervises the first Game Design Master at the European Institute of Design in Milan, Italy. His research focuses on the cultural, social and theoretical aspects of emerging technology, with an emphasis on the interrelations of popular culture, visual culture, and the arts.

Ruth Catlow is an Internet artist and co-founder and director of furtherfield.org with Marc Garrett. She works with people, digital and network media, sculpture, writing, music and drawing--in the streets and other public spaces and on the Internet. She is currently Associate Senior lecturer in Constructed and Virtual Environments at Ravensbourne College of Design and Communication, UK

I never considered using the word "pure" along with new media aesthetics, yet this is what a new media center in Santiago de Compostela, Spain has done by naming itself The Museum of Pure Form. This institution offers symposiums and conferences such as the upcoming New Technological Interfaces. But what I find most intriguing is that they are digitizing not paintings but actual sculptures -- I am still not sure what they mean by this exactly, but the idea of a sculpture being digitized is simply surreal. According to information found in the website, they recently digitized works at OPAE Museum in Pisa, and are planning to digitize more works at cgac.org/ in Santiago de Compostela and The National Gallery of Liverpool. It seems that the organizers behind the Museum of Pure Form have quite a unique idea not only of purity, but also of conservation.

ORIGINAL POST: Wed Jan 21, 12:26:27 AM BY: Eduardo NavasFollowing is a response by Stefano Caldana to my last post of January 20, 2004 (above). Caldana's response appears as received:

Dear Eduardo! thank you very much!

about your review, just to point... your explanation is wrong... i explain: CGAC (Centro Galego de Arte Contemporánea) is a museum. We (Roberta Bosco and I) organize the Symposium at CGAC (Santiago de Compostela) in the symphosium there are many guests Ken Rinaldo, Claudia Giannetti, Stelarc, ... etc and Massimo Bergamasco and Antonio Frisoli [Professor of Applied Mechanics at the School of Experimental Sciences of the Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna, Pisa (Italy)] the last two (the italians) are the responsables of the Project "Museum of pure forms" that is a project in wich a Robotic Harm, is used to perceive and enjoy phisical art objects (sculpture etc...), and it's a useful device for blinds....

Museum of pure form is not a art work, they don't digitalise works of art, they just want to give the chance to ppls with handicaps (blinds etc..) to perceive "classic" art works (sculpture etc.. ) shown in diffents museums around the world.

well... here's the explanation they gave: "The Museum of Pure Form aims at exploring new paradigms of interaction with sculptural pieces of arts. The Museum of Pure Form is a Virtual Gallery with digitized sculptures from European and worldwide museums, where the visitor can interact, through the senses of touch and sight, with 3D art forms and sculptures. The use of innovative technologies allows users to perceive suitable tactile stimuli and feel the physical contact with the digital model of statues.

i hope i explained better!! soon stefan ------------

With this in mind I leave all our readers not with a state of error, but a state of virtual reflection...

EDITORS NOTE: Thank you to Stefano Caldana for taking the time to extend the dialog concerning this work. Additional comments and opinions are always encouraged and needed.